La Salle de danse à Arles

In December 1888 Van Gogh was not living alone. Gauguin had come south to share the Yellow House in Arles, and for a few charged weeks the two painters worked side by side, arguing about how pictures should be made. This crowded dance hall shows Gauguin winning the argument for a moment. Van Gogh drops his usual thick, restless brushwork and lays the women of Arles down in flat panels of colour with dark outlines, the way Gauguin favoured. The floor tilts up steeply, a trick borrowed from the Japanese prints he loved. Within weeks the two men would fall out badly and Van Gogh would cut off part of his own ear. Here the room is simply packed, a wall of hats and faces pressed toward us.